The protesters, many of whom are Native Americans who have been demonstrating against the four-state pipeline for months, said in a statement Sunday that the land is theirs by an 1851 treaty and they won’t leave until the pipeline is stopped.

We don’t have to imagine what might have happened if the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge had been occupied by Native Americans. We can see it in action.

Like this:

Snopes.com confirms: Toddlers killed more Americans than terrorists in 2015.

There were 58 total toddler-involved shootings in 2015, including 21 fatal shootings. In comparison, 19 Americans were killed in instances of suspected, reported, or potential Islamic terrorism in 2015. If you count an American victim of the Paris attacks, that number rose to 20.

Not counted in the statistics is the tragic death of Veronica Rutledge, shot in the head by her 2-year-old son in Wal-Mart just after Christmas 2014. He found the handgun in her brand-new gun purse, a gift from her husband.

The most recent story involved a 4-year-old who picked up a gun in the rear seat of a car and shot his mom in the back while she was driving. Fortunately both of them survived. The mom has been described as “a fierce gun advocate and Ted Cruz supporter.”

Today is Day 37 of the armed occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge. The Bundy Gang terrorists have created one martyr after the “suicide by cop” of Robert “LaVoy” Finicum. Four armed holdouts are still camped at the refuge, anticipating a shoot-out with law enforcement. It’s uncertain how this will end.

In an well-written article, Raw Story’s Arun Gupta dissects the problems with the FBI’s response to this terrorist incident, not the least of which is the failure to bring terrorism charges. Gupta has been covering this story from Burns, Oregon.

The lax approach for weeks at Malheur made Burns a magnet for armed militiamen who spread fear in the town. The refuge became a platform for the Bundy militia to promote its radical interpretation of the U.S. Constitution and organize their armed rebellion.

The Bundy episode also exposed how the legal framework of the “war on terror” is used primarily on racial, religious and political grounds. Anti-terrorism laws should be repealed, but it’s notable that the Bundy militia’s actions match the definition of domestic terrorism precisely: “acts dangerous to human life that are a violation of the criminal laws of the United States or of any State” and that “appear to be intended … to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion.”

The armed band has held the Malheur Refuge for more than a month now. The Bundys told reporters they would “kill or be killed if necessary.” They were setting up shadow governments in Eastern Oregon as a step toward overthrowing the U.S. government. Local and federal government employees were threatened. Most recently, Cliven Bundy sent the Harney County sheriff a notarized letter claiming “possession” of the refuge.

But there is no indication arrestees will be charged with domestic terrorism or that the scores of people who came by the refuge offering supplies or aid will be charged with providing material support for terrorism.

..The Bundys are also being spared the throw-the-book-at-them response prosecutors use in post-9/11 terror cases. The contrast is telling because whereas the Bundys plotted actively and openly to use violence to further political ends, the majority of terror cases are cooked up by the FBI. They trap “mentally ill or … economically desperate” Muslim-Americans who wind up with decades-long sentences. Sometimes the charges are astonishingly minor, such as a U.S.-born college student who accepted a 15-year sentence, rather than the 70 years sought by prosecutors, by saying he knew a houseguest was carrying sleeping bags and waterproof socks to an al Qaeda contact in Afghanistan. This severity also extended to Occupy Wall Street. In Cleveland and Chicago, white male anarchists received lengthy sentences after they were goaded, bribed and guided by undercover police and FBI informants to participate in fake terror plots.

The list of convicted terrorists in U.S. prisons consists mostly of Muslims, leftists, and environmentalists. There are very few right-wingers – notably Terry Nichols and Eric Rudolph.

Oregon Public Broadcasting reports that in addition to guns the Bundys are working the lawyers and money angles. The Eugene-based Arnold Law Firm now represents the terrorists, and has set up a website to collect donations for legal bills.

Over the course of the terrorist takeover, The Oregonian has done some really excellent journalism. They told the story of the Burns Paiute Tribe, who were forcibly evicted from their 1.5 million acre reservation by the U.S. Army in 1879. Unlike the Bundys, the tribe can make a good case for having suffered from government oppression.

The tribe later recovered a fraction of its former reservation, 760 acres on the outskirts of town, after agreeing to pay the federal government for the land.

Rep. Ken Ivory’s American Lands Council is using a misleading video on Facebook to claim that the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) deliberately started a 2012 wildfire in Oregon in order to kill cattle grazing on public land. In reality, the 161,000-acre Miller Homestead Fire was lightning-caused.

As is typical for grass fires, the fire front was fast-moving and could only be controlled using back burning techniques to create firebreaks (known as “black line” in firefighting parlance). It’s usually too slow and too dangerous to fight a grass fire directly using hand crews and bulldozers.

Two structures are reported lost in the incident: one, a long-abandoned, roofless mobile home, and the other a single structure within the M.S. Davies homestead (other infrastructure in this area was unharmed). It is also reported some livestock have been lost, though accurate counts have not been confirmed. All residences affected by the Miller Homestead fire have been successfully protected…

Firefighters successfully protected all residences and the hamlet of Frenchglen, but this doesn’t stop the anti-government fanatics from accusing the BLM of “torching homes”!

Local Coordination – Local landowners and permittees were engaged from the initial attack on. A member of the Incident Management Type 3 Team stated, “Local folks worked well with BLM staff during those first few days. There was lots of coordination. BLM crews helped cut fences, open gates and secure cattle.” A landowner and permittee stated, “They worked with me on letting me build direct line that saved important feed from being part of a backfire. They got ideas from me for tying in black line, and it worked.”

Another said that initial attack priorities were set and communicated early with all involved.

Others noted that the Burns District tries to hire local young people for the crews when possible. This helps with knowing people and the land. One stated there is a strong sense that this is their home, and they want to protect it.

…Cattle represent a significant investment and their livelihood to their owners, and great lengths appear to have been taken to get them to safety in conjunction with fire activities.

An example of this occurred at Lone Tree Lake, a small dry reservoir. Six ranchers and a BLM law enforcement officer stayed with about 200 head of cattle while the fire burned around them. Just prior to the fire front reaching them, they burned out around the small dry reservoir to provide a black line for additional safety for the cattle and themselves. Fire managers were aware of this situation, and a helitack crew gave advice on where and when to ignite backfires.

Bear in mind that safety is always of paramount concern in wildland firefighting. Yet BLM personnel took personal risks in order to preserve property for ranchers during this fire.

Like this:

After the arrest of eight Bundy Gang terrorists on Tuesday night, the FBI and Oregon State Police finally set up roadblocks outside the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge HQ that has been occupied for 26 days. However, the FBI offered to let everyone leave peacefully. Three arrests were made at a checkpoint, but others were allowed to go.

Throughout the day Wednesday David Fry, a 27-year-old Ohioan who has kept up a near-constant video live stream in the occupation’s last days, remained at the refuge. His YouTube channel, DefendYourBase, broadcast belligerent statements from the holdouts. That night, Fry said that only five people remained, and that those who departed had left their weapons behind.

Jason Patrick, a former roofer from Georgia, had stepped in to organize the estimated 10 or so people who remained at the federal reserve after the arrest the day before of leaders Ammon Bundy and Ryan Payne and the killing of occupation spokesman Robert “LaVoy” Finicum.

…But Patrick was among those who apparently were on their way out Wednesday evening, supporters said. [Patrick was arrested by the FBI]

Duane Ehmer, the much-photographed horse-mounted cowboy from Irrigon, Oregon, was confirmed to have left.

…A steady trickle of occupiers already had taken up offers to leave, including one of the last remaining leaders, Blaine Cooper [real name: Stanley Blaine Hicks]. Cooper, who is typically active on social media, was quiet on Wednesday and his whereabouts remain unknown.

Shown in the top row are Ammon Bundy, 40, of Emmett, Idaho; Ryan Bundy, 43, of Bunkerville, Nevada; Brian Cavalier, 44, of Bunkerville, Nevada; and Shawna Cox, 59, of Kanab, Utah. Shown in the bottom row are Ryan Waylen Payne, 32, of Anaconda, Montana; Joseph Donald O’Shaughnessy, 45, of Cottonwood, Arizona; and conservative radio host Pete Santilli, 50, of Cincinnati, Ohio. Jon Eric Ritzheimer, 32, also turned himself into the FBI in Phoenix on a federal charge related to the occupation.

The Oregonian’s OregonLive website keeps up to date with the latest developments in the ongoing Bundy Gang terrorist occupation of Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon. We are now on Day 25, and there is no sign of action from federal law enforcement.

Negotiations between terror group leader Ammon Bundy and the FBI seem to have broken down because all Bundy wants to negotiate are the terms under which the entire U.S. Government is supposed to surrender to HIM. Because nobody else understands what our Constitution says about public property, or something.

Like this:

The son of Cliven Bundy, a hodgepodge of right-wing and anti-Islam activists and local Oregon militia members have occupied the visitor center at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Burns, Oregon in an apparent bid to provoke a confrontation with federal law enforcement.

No, this is NOT a “peaceful” protest. These guys are heavily armed terrorists seeking violence.

“After the peaceful rally was completed today, a group of outside militants drove to the Malheur Wildlife Refuge, where they seized and occupied the refuge headquarters. A collective effort from multiple agencies is currently working on a solution. For the time being please stay away from that area. More information will be provided as it becomes available. Please maintain a peaceful and united front and allow us to work through this situation.”

A Twitter report from Jason Wilson, the Guardian’s reporter on the scene:

I drove out there. It was just them – no law enforcement and no other media. I was not allowed to enter and strongly encouraged to leave.

For the militants, the morning press briefings are the oxygen that breathes life into their occupation. This is the occupiers’ chance to repeat their message, knowing the press will listen, hoping there will be some news of when this might end.

…Federal agents have a different media strategy than the militants — they want the press to get lost.

Now entering their third week of occupying the Malheur national wildlife refuge in rural Harney County, leaders of the militia appear to be testing the patience of the local sheriff’s department and the FBI by brazenly commandeering and in some cases destroying public property while escalating their anti-government rhetoric.

They know a terrorist when they see one in Minnesota. Last April, federal authorities arrested six Minneapolis men of Somali descent, aged 19 to 21, for the alleged crime of wanting to join ISIS. They now face up to five years in federal prison and a fine up to $250,000.

But these guys? Not terrorists. Abundant evidence indicates they were engaged in a conspiracy to disrupt a peaceful Black Lives Matter protest. One of them shot five protesters, including a man who nearly died.

What are the charges? The shooter has been charged with one count of second-degree riot while armed and five counts of second-degree assault, and may be subject to a long prison term if found guilty. The other three defendants were charged with second-degree riot.

No charge of attempted murder. No conspiracy charges. No terrorism charges. No hate crime charges.

Terrorism is not treated lightly in the Minnesota criminal justice system. It has a broad definition in Minnesota, including both personal and public threats and acts. Personal threats of substantial bodily harm to another can be classified as terroristic threats in certain contexts. Threats with the intent of causing public disorder are certainly terroristic, and carry a heavier penalty than most personal threats…

…Minnesota criminal law increases the penalty for any felony by 50% if the premeditated intent was to further terrorism (Minn. Stat. 609.714). The intent to further terrorism is the intent to:

1. terrorize, intimidate, or coerce a considerable number of members of the public in addition to the direct victims of the act; and
2. significantly disrupt or interfere with the lawful exercise, operation, or conduct of government, lawful commerce, or the right of lawful assembly.

There is a chance the U.S. Department of Justice will step in and bring more serious charges.

Politico provides even more evidence, some of which was left out of the 9/11 Commission’s report, that the Worst President Ever had the Worst National Security Advisor Ever. Not that we needed any more evidence.

By May of 2001, says Cofer Black, then chief of the CIA’s counterterrorism center, “it was very evident that we were going to be struck, we were gonna be struck hard and lots of Americans were going to die.”

…The drama of failed warnings began when Tenet and Black pitched a plan, in the spring of 2001, called “the Blue Sky paper” to Bush’s new national security team. It called for a covert CIA and military campaign to end the Al Qaeda threat—“getting into the Afghan sanctuary, launching a paramilitary operation, creating a bridge with Uzbekistan.” “And the word back,” says Tenet, “‘was ‘we’re not quite ready to consider this. We don’t want the clock to start ticking.’” (Translation: they did not want a paper trail to show that they’d been warned.)

…That morning of July 10, the head of the agency’s Al Qaeda unit, Richard Blee, burst into Black’s office. “And he says, ‘Chief, this is it. Roof’s fallen in,’” recounts Black. “The information that we had compiled was absolutely compelling. It was multiple-sourced. And it was sort of the last straw.” Black and his deputy rushed to the director’s office to brief Tenet. All agreed an urgent meeting at the White House was needed. Tenet picked up the white phone to Bush’s National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice. “I said, ‘Condi, I have to come see you,’” Tenet remembers. “It was one of the rare times in my seven years as director where I said, ‘I have to come see you. We’re comin’ right now. We have to get there.’”

Tenet vividly recalls the White House meeting with Rice and her team. (George W. Bush was on a trip to Boston.) “Rich [Blee] started by saying, ‘There will be significant terrorist attacks against the United States in the coming weeks or months. The attacks will be spectacular. They may be multiple. Al Qaeda’s intention is the destruction of the United States.’” [Condi said:] ‘What do you think we need to do?’ Black responded by slamming his fist on the table, and saying, ‘We need to go on a wartime footing now!’”

“What happened?” I ask Cofer Black. “Yeah. What did happen?” he replies. “To me it remains incomprehensible still. I mean, how is it that you could warn senior people so many times and nothing actually happened? It’s kind of like The Twilight Zone.”

Just as a reminder, several of the al-Qaeda operatives involved in the 9/11 terror plot were already in the USA. Their identitieswere known to the FBI. If the Bush administration had heeded the numerous warnings, could the pieces of the puzzle have come together before September 11, 2001?

Like this:

Last Friday, presidential candidate Donald Trump committed what might be the ultimate Tea-GOP gaffe. A gaffe is when a politician says something that is true, but politically awkward to mention out loud in a public forum. For example, House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) told Sean Hannity that the Benghazi committee was all about hurting Hillary Clinton’s poll numbers. What could be worse than that?

Here’s the quote that’s causing so much heartburn: “When you talk about George Bush, I mean, say what you want, the World Trade Center came down during his time,” Trump said. “He was president, O.K.?”Uh-oh.

Senator Rick Santorum is probably sorry one of his aides didn’t rush him off before the public had a chance to submit questions on the “Overtime” segment of the popular HBO “Real Time” political series from August 28th 2015, which takes place after the HBO cable show signs off. Americans want to know why Republicans are so upset about Obama’s recent diplomacy successes in Iran.

To those of you who are as tired of Reagan worship as I am, this might interest you. Let me try to capsulize a little American history for you here.

Near the end of the seventies, president Jimmy Carter was humiliated by Ted Koppel’s “Nightline” program, which started out every night with a countdown of how many days our second worst enemy – behind Russia – had held American hostages in that “terrorist” country. The American media still avoids touching on what Republican operatives did to gain political prominence during those times.

To make a long story short: Republicans made a secret deal to sell weapons to the “terrorists” in Iran so they could use them against our “friends” in Iraq, while at the same time, making Carter look weak by requiring Iran to detain our hostages until the very moment Reagan was sworn in. Cute.

That’s what Maher is alluding to in this video, which was not broadcast on his cable show. The lesson Democrats are supposed to learn, is that only Republicans can negotiate with “terrorists”. When THEY do it, it’s called a “deal”. Notice the, I got caught, look on Santorum’s face. He’ll be telling the same lie starting tomorrow.